DPWH-ARMM hailed region's top performing agency

COTABATO CITY, Philippines – The public works department of the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM) was named ARMM’s “top performer” via a screening process initiated under the Governor’s Initiative on System Assessment (GISA).

The ARMM’s Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH-ARMM) was one of more than 30 line agencies and support offices a panel of regional officials evaluated, from June to July 2014, based on the performance enhancement objectives of GISA.

GISA was institutionalized by the present ARMM administration to ensure efficient governance and delivery of services to the region’s Muslim, Christian and lumad sectors.

ARMM’s regional executive secretary, lawyer Laisa Alamia, told reporters that it was for the DPWH-ARMM’s effective and transparent implementation of costly infrastructure projects, and stringent handling of its coffers that the agency topped the list of efficient departments and support offices under the Office of the Regional Governor (ORG).

The ORG, touted as ARMM’s “Little Malacañang,” exercises ministerial control over different agencies and departments whose functions and powers were devolved by the national government to the region, as prescribed by its charter, the Republic Act 9054.

Alamia said it was for the management innovations, jointly introduced by ARMM Gov. Mujiv Hataman and Regional Public Works Secretary Hadji Emil Sadain into the agency’s bureaucracy, that hastened the accomplishment of its expected targets from early 2012 until July this year.

The DPWH-ARMM generated almost P300 million-worth of savings in the past two years, enabling the agency to procure costly road-building equipment for its component provincial district engineering offices in Maguindanao and Lanao del Sur, both in mainland Mindanao, and the island provinces of Basilan, Sulu and Tawi-Tawi.

The central office of the Department of Budget and Management (DBM) had earlier lauded the DPWH-ARMM for having saved a big amount of state funds it received from the DBM in the past two years.

The DPWH-ARMM also got a high performance grade for its having either constructed new, or rehabilitated a total of 524.4 kilometers of old road networks, out of a P7.5 billion budget for 2012 and 2013.

Norkhalila Mae Mambuay-Campong, ARMM’s cabinet secretary, told reporters the GISA performance assessment process, which the regional departments and support offices underwent, was premised on a rating parameter of 50 percent completeness and consistency, 20 percent readiness, 15 percent attendance and participation, and 15 percent response capability during the actual panel evaluation. 

Campong said next to the DPWH-ARMM are the Regional Board of Investments and the Department of Science and Technology as the region’s top performers.